Thermo-oxidative Degradation Assessment in Quasi-isotropic Carbon Fiber/Epoxy Composites

Components made from polymer matrix composites (PMCs) are finding increasing use in armored vehicles for the purpose of weight savings and fuel efficiency. Often times, these PMC components are installed next to engines, or in other high-temperature environments within the vehicle. The present work investigates the change in surface chemistry and its correlation with changes in the interlaminar shear strength (ILSS) due to accelerated thermo-oxidative aging of a quasi-isotropic carbon fiber reinforced epoxy laminate. Samples are aged isothermally at various temperatures whose selection is guided by degradation steps revealed by thermo-gravimetric analysis. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) photoacoustic spectroscopy is utilized to identify the chemical changes due to aging, and compression-test results reveal a non-linear decrease in ILSS with increasing aging temperature. A correlation between the FTIR and ILSS data sets suggests that nondestructive FTIR techniques may be used for assessing ILSS of PMCs.